THE FRAILTY OF democratic institutions and the strength of the armed forces function conjointly throughout Pakistan’s his­tory to reinforce a strong executive and disturb any easy map­ping of a trichotomous governmental order.

As discussed in Chapter 3, the relative strength of the executive branch of government has been bolstered by the fiat exercised by extra-constitutional rulers to reframe the rules with each such assumption of power.

Those who are unacquainted with the structure of the Pakistani Constitution could be forgiven for thinking that the army has a formally prescribed role of power-sharing in government. On the contrary, the ubiquity of the armed forces in the institutions of government has happened in spite of constitutional measures to ensure the army’s sub­servience to civilian rule. Additionally, the expanse of emergency pow­ers that are outlined in the Constitution do not up-end representative government altogether, nor do they provide a formal opening for army intervention. The record of constitutional adjudication on the use of ‘actions in aid of civil powers’ and emergency provisions of the Con­stitution shows heightened scrutiny of executive acts that flow from the use of these provisions. Nonetheless, the historical record speaks also to the creation of conditions conducive to military adventurism when they are employed. Additionally, the same judicial actors impos­ing limits on the use of exceptional powers by democratically-elected governments are quick to validate extra-constitutional acts undertaken by military rulers.

One direct consequence of military rule, at least in the short run, is to coalesce all political power in the executive branch. In the longer run, the two long periods of military rule that followed the enactment of the 1973 Constitution significantly bolstered the powers of the President. Notably, increases in the President’s realm of discretionary powers invested the officeholder with the ability to dissolve elected assemblies by the insertion of Article 58(2)(b). The repeated use of these powers was of great consequence in limiting the terms of democratically- elected governments through the 1990s.

The democratic impulse, when exercised, has been to invest execu­tive powers in the office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. As section IV, below, illustrates though, democratic officeholders are also prone to compromising the principles and conventions of parliamentary government. In form, they thus end up replicating the heavy centrali­sations of executive authority that military rulers display. Starting with the record of Zulfiqar Bhutto in the 1970s and then looking at some instances from the 1990s, the acts of successive leaders of govern­ment can be understood as attempts to forestall military intervention yet are simultaneously a betrayal of the democratic aspirations of electors.

Through these shifts between a strong President and Prime Minister what remains constant is that the concentration of powers and the ver­tical linkages of executive rule have deep social reach and impact. Law and order, economic development and a range of fields that structure state/society relations are impacted by the pervasive role of the execu­tive. In recent years, judicial oversight of executive decision-making has grown more elaborate. In the process, a public record of executive functioning is being compiled.

As inherited from colonial rule, the executive ordinance forms an anomalous feature of Pakistan’s constitutional structure. The conferral of legislative powers in the office of the President has been of far- reaching consequence. Yet, other than in initial apprehensions voiced about its inclusion in the 1973 Constitution, democratic forces have demonstrated no major desire to see these powers reduced.

I.